Automobile Cruise Control:

With Fuel Lag and Disturbances

ME 530 Project
May 15, 2014
Team #13:
Ethan Nies
Phong Huynh
Ryan Tang
Matt Graf

Executive Summary
 The cruise control system is responsible for maintaining the speed of the car at a
desired value while taking into account the disturbances from the road and the fuel
assembly. The system must actively account for any outside or unexpected
disturbances and inconsistencies in attempts to compensate the speed and adjust
accordingly. Control methods regarding fuel regulation and delivery must be considered
and accounted for, as well as a system attempt to adjust for such inconsistencies.

Performance Goals:
Input Design Spec #1 Design Spec #2

Small Signal Input Tpeak = 1 s 20% overshoot

Large Signal Input Tpeak= 10 s 10% overshoot

Small Disturbance Response Tpeak = 2 s Tsettle = 5 s

Large Disturbance Response Tpeak = 4 s Tsettle = 15 s

Actual Performance:
Input Design Spec #1 Design Spec #2
 Small Signal Input Tpeak = 9.02 s 2.29% overshoot

Large Signal Input Tpeak= 8.33 s 13.3% overshoot

Small Disturbance Response Tpeak = 5.94s Tsettle = 20.2 s

Large Disturbance Response Tpeak = 6.29 s Tsettle = 43.17 s

In conclusion, we as a group were unable to fully satisfy any of our design goals.
While we were able to meet our goal for small signal overshoot and large signal peak
time, the other specifications were out of reach. We reached our specifications by
agreeing on values believed to be attainable in a real world scenario. I believe we did
not reach our specifications, primarily peak time and percent overshoot, was due to the
fact that our system did not include integrator anti wind up or variable gain control. The
difficulty lied within the oscillations of our system. In order to get the system to respond
more quickly, it would result in speed oscillations of as much as 4 mph. Without the
ability to increase of integrator gain without sacrificing velocity oscillations, which would
cause unnecessary fuel usage, our design goals were unable to be reached.

It is our recommendation at this time that further study regarding the system be
done. It would also be of great value to include variable gain control along with the
combination of anti wind up in cruise control systems to avoid excessive overshoot and
to decrease the peak and settling times of the automobile.

Application:

Cruise control has been a selling feature on consumer cars since the 1950’s, grown from the
initial centrifugal engine governor on James Watt’s steam engines. With numerous benefits and
an effective range of applicability, from control a vehicle's speed on a long drive to reducing the
number of power surges reducing fuel consumption, cruise control systems are used daily.
Background:

The cruise control system as we have come to know it, is essentially a glorified governor. The
regulation of speed of an engine was first developed by James Watt, who used the centrifugal
force of two flyballs connected to the output shaft of an engine. As the rate of working fluid is
increased the throttle valve opens giving the flyballs more kinetic energy. This causes the
connecting lever to pull on the thrust bearing causing the throttle valve to close. With the
development of technology, the cruise control in modern cars are controlled by an electronic or
vacuum actuators, which open or close the throttle valve to maintain a constant speed. The
majority of the work is done by the ECU, the cars on board computer, which uses sensors to
measure speed, acceleration, throttle angle.

Tasks:

The system must be able to factor in current speed of the vehicle, forces acting on the vehicle
which may inhibit the desired speed, and account for possible delays in the fuel delivery
assembly which may not yield desired engine output. All these factors will contribute to the
overall cruise control performance of the automobile.

Environment:

The environment is what one would consider a typical vehicle setting, relatively stable
conditions, dry, sunny, with forces of drag and perhaps changes in gradient of hills which would
affect the need engine force to maintain the set velocity of the cruise control.

Power sources:

The fuel pump and sensors should be drawing power from the vehicles electrical systems,
which are powered by a battery (charged by the excess rotational energy of the drive shafts),
while the engine will be deriving power from the combustion of fuel (metered by the fuel
assembly). Our plant specifications was designed to emulate the performance and traits of a
luxury coupe car. While we are limited to consumer cars to maintain a realistic necessity for
velocity control, luxury cars provide a good balance between high end performance and the
quickly growing technology of speed control and cruise control systems. We factored in
maximum engine output, possible limits in fuel regulation, and limits to outside environments
such as hill steepness and drag forces.
M-mass: 1000 lbs
Vel-initial velocity: 65 mph (used for drag force calculation)
A-frontal area: 23 ft2
Tc-car time constant: 12 s
Ta-actuator time const: .1 s
fuel delay: .3 s
dFhill/da = (1000lbm)(32.2 ft/s^2)(sin1)=17.4665 lbf/degree
dFeng/Dtangle= 15 lbs/degree

Cost is an issue, as we will be simply designing the system which is implemented within
a consumer automobile. We will need to keep costs down to a relatively low percentage of the
total cost of a luxury vehicle in the United States. The project would foreseeably require sensors
and actuators of minimal cost, but would have to survive in an automotive environment,
meaning resistant to corrosion, relatively shock proof, exposure to moisture and sunlight,
periods of relative heat and cold shock. Parts secured for the implementation of this project
must be able to not only survive these conditions, but survive long exposure to these conditions,
as we all very well know, many owners subject their vehicles to very unpleasant conditions.

Our initial design goals proved to be slightly lofty. Initially, we were aiming to keep a
large signal step input of 15 mph under a peak time of 10 seconds with a maximum overshoot of
7%, equal to approximately 1 mph. For a small step input of 1 mph, we wanted the car to
respond with a peak time of .5 second and 10% overshoot, as a faster response would be
beneficial for small signals and a higher overshoot can be tolerated due to the small difference
in overall speed.

The disturbance response goals for our project were a maximum overshoot of 10% and
settling time of 4 seconds for small disturbances of 1 degree of hill change. For a large
disturbance, 5 degrees of hill change), our goal was to have the system with a settling time of
15 seconds and a maximum overshoot of 15%.
After building the model in Vissim, our design goals loosened slightly to the following:

Input Design Spec #1 Design Spec #2

Small Signal Input Tpeak = 1 s 20% overshoot

Large Signal Input Tpeak= 10 s 10% overshoot

Small Disturbance Response Tpeak = 2 s Tsettle = 5 s

Large Disturbance Response Tpeak = 4 s Tsettle = 15 s

Large Signal Graph and Performance: dV= 15 mph

Disturbance Response to 5 degrees of hill

PID control compound block:

Drag Force compound block:

Frequency Response
Small Signal Performance: dV= 1 mph

Disturbance Response to 1 degree of hill